During the manufacturing of semiconductor devices, unwanted particles are often deposited on wafers from known or unknown sources. Such deposition may occur on various layers of a wafer, such as the substrate, photoresist layer, photo mask layer, and/or other layers of the wafer. As the dimensions of wafers continue to decrease, the presence of even a few particles may adversely affect the quality of the semiconductor device and result in the reduction of yield. For example, due to the presence of one or more particles on the surface of a wafer, an etching process may result in an undesired uneven surface.
Accordingly, manufacturers strive to remove undesirable particles from wafers. However, previously available art is focused on passively detecting defects caused by the presence of particles. Frequently, manufacturers simply impose such responsibilities upon the operators, who are already burdened with the ordinary operational tasks. Since the probability of particle deposition on the wafers is random, it is challenging to identify the root cause of the deposition and means for eliminating them. As a result, semiconductor devices have to been discarded due to defects caused by the presence of particles that should have been removed.